


wildest dreamings

by homosociality



Category: Glee
Genre: Consensual Underage Sex, Glee Season/Series 02, M/M, Polyamory, Threesome - M/M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:02:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 18,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23597290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/homosociality/pseuds/homosociality
Summary: When Sam makes out with Puck on a dare, everything changes.An alternate season 2 that carries the Sam x Kurt relationship to its logical conclusion. And then adds Puck.
Relationships: Sam Evans/Kurt Hummel/Noah Puckerman
Comments: 12
Kudos: 24





	1. and i was meant for you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lavenderlotion](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lavenderlotion/gifts).



> This fic is dedicated to [lavenderlotion](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lavenderlotion/pseuds/lavenderlotion), friend, co-conspirator, and terrible fucking influence.

The first thing he notices about Kurt is that he has _astonishing_ eyes.

“I just wanted to _personally_ welcome you to the Glee Club,” he says, grinning widely, and Sam smiles a little shyly at him and mumbles something that sounds like “thanks.” Everyone is so… weirdly friendly around here. He thought that people in the North were supposed to be brusque and cold, but maybe Ohio doesn’t count as “the North”? Not one person has made a comment about cocksucking lips, except the football player everyone calls Puck, and he’d laughed when Sam had fired back at him about balls. A comment like that at his old school would’ve gotten him punched.

Kurt is looking at him closely. Expectantly. “Just tell me.”

Sam frowns. _That I’m a nerd and a dork and I don’t belong in this letterman jacket?_ Surely that’s not what Kurt means. He shrugs self-consciously.

Kurt advances on him in a way that makes him think of a lynx, some predatory large cat, and Sam is suddenly tempted to step back, bare his throat to the alpha. “Look. _Maybe_ at your old school you could get away with the whole ‘I-just-stayed-in-the-sun-all-summer-excuse,’ but I have three gifts: my voice, my ability to spot trends in men’s fashion, and my ability to know when it comes out of a bottle.” Immediately, Sam starts to sweat. Oh, god. _Everyone_ can tell, can’t they?

“I don’t dye my hair, dude,” he says, trying to keep his voice as natural as possible.

“Yes, you do,” Kurt says sweetly. “But it’s just between friends. That’s not natural.”

Maybe he should change his mind about Glee Club. Can they all spot his dye job? Oh, god, why did he ever think this was a good idea? “You’ll look hot,” Marian had said. “With the football jacket, you’ll be the perfect all-American boy. Plus, it’ll deemphasize the… you know. No one will even think of swirlying you.” He’d left Marian, his best and only friend, behind in Tennessee, but either way he was never listening to her again. Straight guys didn’t dye their hair. Not even, he was beginning to suspect, in Ohio.

“I’m gonna… go, because you’re kind of freaking me out,” Sam mumbles. Deny, deny, deny. He turns to scuttle off when Kurt reaches out—

“Wait, wait,” he says, turning to walk with him. “Maybe my instincts were a little off. Let me make it up to you! Team up with me for the duet competition.” He tries to wave him off, wanting to exit this conversation post haste, but Kurt barrels on, “Listen, unless you team up with Rachel, I am your best bet at winning.”

“Aren’t duets supposed to be between a girl and a guy?” Sam asks. The very last thing he needs is for people to start calling him Sam the Suck. Again.

“Gene Kelly and Donald O’Connor would protest,” Kurt says, which means nothing to him. “‘Make ‘Em Laugh’?”

“Sorry,” Sam says, already feeling out of his depth, like when the guys at his old school would talk about the Titans or who had whose hand up whose skirt.

 _“Singin’ in the Rain_? 1952. Nothing? Okay, maybe you are straight.”

“What,” Sam says, and a panic-sweat like nothing he’s ever known runs down his spine. It’s been _four weeks_. Kurt is—gay, clearly, but he’s. He’s not like Sam. He walks around with such pride, and the Glee Club has talked about being losers, but Kurt doesn’t seem to get any more flack than Rachel or Tina. Maybe it’s different here. He still can’t risk it.

“Nothing. Listen, rent it, and then look up the menu for Breadstix online, and call me, because we are gonna _win this_.” And in flash of green-and-red stripes, he’s gone. Sam is stuck staring after him, wondering if he’d said a single intelligible word during that whole conversation, and kicking himself for getting lost, once again, in a pair of beautiful eyes.

Maybe he could get Kurt to wear sunglasses during their duet.  
  
  
  
 _Singin’ in the Rain_ is surprisingly funny, though. Sam likes movies, old and new—Hitchcock especially, not the scary films but the romantic ones, _North by Northwest_ and the like. He’s never really seen a TV musical before, except for _The Sound of Music_ , which their family watches every December when it comes on ABC. It’s Stacey’s favorite movie. She insists that he sing along with Maria, which is how he learned to harmonize; he plays along when she teaches the kids “Do a Deer.” He’s memorized every song in _The Sound of Music_ twice over.

That is probably something else that he can’t tell anyone at McKinley unless he wants his life to be over.  
  
  
  
Finn corners him in the locker room the next day and says, “Look, dude, you can’t sing with Kurt.”

“Why?” Sam says blankly. Kurt is—crisp and nice-smelling and has a voice that sounds exactly like Faith Hill’s. McKinley is already such a different experience from his old school. He’s cool… _ish_ , varsity quarterback even though he’s only a sophomore, and there are _girls_ here, so surely… surely if he got a girlfriend quickly enough, he could steal a moment or two alone with Kurt, staring into those astonishing blue-green eyes and singing about. About making ‘em laugh, maybe. 

“Everyone’s going to think you’re gay,” Finn says bluntly, and just two days ago that would’ve sent him running for the hills, to his parents to beg them to move somewhere else, anywhere else, to send him to a different school where he could start over again and pretend to be someone else, _anyone else_ , but Kurt. Kurt is. Kurt has already magnetized Sam to himself, and he feels like a planet rocked in orbit. He’s terrified of the instant attraction that had sparked between them, the stupid things it might make him do. But he’s also… exhilarated by it. It’s like watching Jake Sully be transformed by the Tree of Souls, seeing for the first time the true person behind the husk everyone is convinced is the real you, even if you turn out to be something you’d never expected. “Your life will be over, man.”

Finn natters on about social hierarchies and how they’re living in their world, but Sam tilts his head up, ready to do battle. He’s faced worse. He’s surely faced worse. “I gave him my word,” he says, resolute. “In _my_ world, that’s that.”  
  
  
  
McKinley is next to a 7/11 and a condom store, which means that immediately after he says that, he is introduced to an entirely new way of bullying: the Slushie.

Quinn wipes at his face with a dish towel—apparently she keeps them in her locker for situations like these—and is seriously considering just doing the duet with Kurt and then quitting Glee Club entirely (but maybe they can hang out? in private, where no one from school can… read something that’s not there into it?) when he meets Quinn’s eyes in the mirror and his breath catches.

They’re not as luminous as Kurt’s, but—Sam has never felt this way about a girl before. And then she mentions _Avatar_. The instant spark of electricity jumping between them, the fatal rush of chemistry—it gives Sam hope, bubbling, instant hope, maybe he’s just been confused all this time, maybe he doesn’t like guys after all, or at least not _exclusively_. In Quinn, in that instant, he sees a whole future, a future where he’s not Sam the Suck, a world where he’s just Sam, varsity quarterback and maybe Glee Club guy, where maybe he has 2.5 kids and doesn’t have to move somewhere big and scary like New York City to avoid getting jumped in an alley by guys with baseball bats. He falls in love with her at that moment just for that—just for that instant that passes between them, even though it’s not as strong as what he felt for Kurt, even though nothing may ever be as strong as what he felt for Kurt. Even if he’s still going to do the duet with him.

He bumbles out flirtations. She rolls her eyes, but looks charmed in spite of herself. Sam hopes.  
  
  
  
And then Kurt calls it off.

He glances down right before he walks away, and smirks, and Sam is briefly horrified and self-conscious before he remembers about the dye job and how he’s just proven Kurt right all along, and he hopes that’s some solace to Kurt, because he knows that he must’ve been getting pressure from Finn and guys like Finn all along.

It means now he can pursue Quinn, without the baggage of being interested in someone else. That’s something.

Still. He can’t stop thinking about Kurt’s eyes.  
  
  
  
He tells Quinn about his dye job, but not the other thing, because the pain in her eyes hurts and anyway he’s not even sure the other thing matters anymore. He gives Quinn the promise ring because of the promise he sees in those eyes that he’s so captivated by.

He punches Karofsky because of the sheer terror he can see in Kurt’s eyes, the way they’re getting duller and duller each day, the way they have faded almost to pure blue, and yet are still the most beautiful Sam has ever seen.  
  
  
  
Kurt transfers.

And that’s all there is to say about that.  
  
  
  
But before he leaves, he stops Sam, and says, “Thank you. Again. For what you did for me.”

Sam looks at him, drinks his fill of that gray-green gaze, and sees how it’s lit up for the first time in a long time with something like hope. “You don’t have to thank me, Kurt,” he says softly.

“No, I do. I do. See, because I know it would’ve been easier to stick with the football guys. Every single one of the football players in the room behind us has tried to quit before. Sometimes they even succeeded.” Kurt adjusts his hair. “I used to be on the football team, did you know that? So I know. I know what it’s like, to have popularity in sight, just within your grasp… and choose Glee Club instead. Thank you, not just for me, but from all of us. For standing with Glee.”

He makes it sound almost heroic.

The others forgive Karofsky when he joins in at the halftime dance, but Sam doesn’t. Sam remembers. And he’s proven right, isn’t he? When Karofsky shakes off Finn’s hand on his shoulder and storms away, off to intimidate someone else, probably. Sam looks at him and sees the faces of his tormentors. He’s too well-mannered to go around punching Karofsky all the time. But he wants to, oh, he wants to.  
  
  
  
Being in Glee is nice. _A family_ , Mr. Schue says often, but if so Sam is the little brother who came in late and doesn’t know most of the history. It’s Puck, weirdly, who takes him under his wing, Puck who he replaced, sort of, although he supposes it’s now Kurt who he’s replacing, which hurts in a strange sort of hollowing-of-the-chest kind of way. It’s Puck who hangs out with him after school, the two of them leaning against the railing watching people duck furtively in and out of the condom shop, and fills him in on all the drama that happened last year, while he was getting beat up and shoved into lockers at his old school.

People might think it’s weird, being friends with your girl’s baby daddy, but Puck is… strange. He’s mellow and furious by turns. The Puck Sam remembers from the beginning of the year, disaffected and moody, has retreated into a new creature, one who agrees to get tutoring from Artie and can be pensive and thoughtful in one moment and then swaggering and braggy in the next. He never talks about Quinn with anything than the utmost respect, though, which is more courtesy than most guys in the school, especially on the football team, give him. “Since when is it gay to be a gentleman?” he complains to Marian on the phone after the second time someone asks him about Quinn’s stretch marks. She’d sounded warily happy that he had a girlfriend, though not as excited for him as he’d wanted her to be. He thinks she thinks that he’s fooling himself, that Quinn’s a beard, but she’s not. She’s all smooth skin and angles and a low, swaying voice like being rocked to sleep in a hammock, and so what if that describes someone else he had the briefest of crushes on a few weeks ago? So he has a type. He _is_ attracted to Quinn, he knows that much. The whole Beiste debacle had proved that.

“So then Rachel asked me to do a song with her,” Puck is saying as he’s kicking at a can. “Except she also asked Jesse and Finn.”

“Who’s Jesse again?”

“Think gay Michael Buble,” Puck tells him, and Sam nods sagely. “Anyway, Artie smushed it all together into this music video that made it seem like we were all fighting over her, even though the song wasn’t really about that at all, and Finn and Jesse both got mad and stormed off. I didn’t really care, though. It was actually good for my rep back then, that I got duped by a three-timer. Added a kind of boyish vulnerability to my whole bad-boy mystique.”

It’s things like this that make Sam think that Puck is the one to ask about the whole popularity issue. Finn is the king of the school, but there’s some… friction between Finn and Sam, after the whole quarterback thing, after the whole Karofsky thing. Finn doesn’t really get Slushied anymore, unless there’s some drama going on between the Glee Club and the jocks _that week_. Puck is more down-to-earth, more relatable. He’s had his hard knocks, like getting locked inside that Port-a-Potty. But when he does ask, Puck just shrugs. “Get thrown in juvie?” he suggests. “It worked for me.”

“It didn’t,” Sam points out.

“So don’t get thrown in juvie,” Puck says, which is useful, but perhaps not as useful as Sam was hoping.  
  
  
  
Then Sam’s dad loses his job, and everything changes.

At first, Sam is worried, but not overly so. They’ve had lean periods before. Sam’s dad got laid off when he was in second grade, and he found a new job within two months. But his parents whisper to each other late at night, whispering that almost grows into shouting, and Sam worries. Is this always what it’s like when someone loses their job? Had he just missed it when he was seven?

It’s not, it turns out.

His parents explain it to him slowly, a talk so much worse than the one they had about condoms and pregnancy when Sam was fourteen. They spent a lot of money on the move. The economy sucks and Dad might not get a new job anytime soon, and the industry he works in in Lima is very small. They’re spending the rest of their savings on the mortgage payment this month.

“What’s a mortgage?” Sam asks. He’s heard the word before—he’s dumb, not _stupid_ —but he never actually needed to know what it was, beyond something that you paid each month that was a lot of money. His parents explain it to him. It’s what they have to pay if they want to keep the house.

They don’t keep the house.  
  
  
  
Quinn cheats on him, and he _knows_ it’s because she and Finn have unfinished business, but he can’t help but wonder. He can’t help but wonder.  
  
  
  
He quits the basketball team to look after Stacey and Stevie. Basketball is just something for the football players to do in the spring, anyway, it’s not an actual popularity-booster the way football is. It’s not enough. They might not make the motel payments, and then they really _will_ be homeless, the way that people who live in cardboard boxes on the streets are homeless. Santana makes out with him, but it’s strange, he doesn’t tell her the way he told Quinn. He doesn’t lean on her, and anyway he gets the impression that she’s thinking of someone else when she lets him touch her boobs too. He thinks of Quinn, at first, but eventually he stops touching her boobs and keeps his hands at her waist, closes his eyes and thinks of—

Anyway.

Santana’s eyes are… pretty, he supposes. A deep, mesmerizing brown. It’s just. He’s always liked green eyes.  
  
  
  
He gets a job delivering pizzas late at night. His homework suffers, but he’s not failing anything yet, and his parents have stopped looking at his report cards anyway. He knows enough to help Stacey with her multiplication, so that’s fine. The pizza delivery job is only minimum wage, but he gets to keep the tips, and he likes driving around Lima and Westerville when drunk college students and overworked office drones order pizza. It all shuts down, except for Breadstix and a few bars and the lights twinkling inside homes. He doesn’t have a home, but sometimes, when he’s driving around with pizzas in the backseat, he imagines that it’s pizza night and one of these homes is his, and when he gets home Stevie will pick the pineapple off of his Hawaiian and Stacey will whine over anchovies, which no one else likes, and everything will be okay.

They haven’t had the money to eat out in a while. It’s mostly mac n’cheese from a box. 

He doesn’t register the address at first. He pulls up to a low, long brick building with huge windows and looks for Complex C, Room F4. He’s instantly familiar with the feel of the school, the slightly over-teased scent of testosterone; this is an all-boys’ school, he knows, the kind with uniforms and tuition upwards of $10,000 a year. It’s strange that he feels at home here, when _home_ has been a motel room for the last three weeks. He knocks on the door—

—and Kurt opens it.

“Uh,” Sam says, feeling dumber than he ever has in his life. Kurt blinks at him, clearly taken aback. There’s ab boy sitting on his bed. There’s a _boy_ sitting on his _bed_. “Pizza delivery?”

“ _Sam?”_ Kurt asks bewilderedly. The _boy_ on his _bed_ makes a questioning noise. “I don’t—it’s 2AM, what are you doing delivering pizzas?”

“What are you doing _ordering_ pizza?” Sam snarks back.

“Midterm tomorrow. We’re cramming,” Kurt says. “Your turn.”

“I—”

Sam never stood a chance.

Horrifyingly, he feels tears start to rise to his eyes. Heat burns in his cheeks. Kurt’s eyes, those luminous, spectacular eyes, grow round as moons and he ushers him in, taking the pizza from Sam and tossing it aside, and perches Sam on his desk chair and kneels next to him. “Sam?” he asks waveringly. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t—” He casts eyes at the boy.

Kurt immediately turns around. “Blaine,” he says, “why don’t you take the pizza to the common room and see if anyone wants a piece? I might be out later.”

“Sure,” the _boy_ on his _bed_ says. “Sure, Kurt.” He shoots Sam a curious look, which Sam can’t even return through red-rimmed eyes. So Kurt is dating this guy, Blaine, which, whatever, he looks kind of like a tool with all that hair gel—Kurt’s hair is pretty well gelled down too, but it’s two in the morning and it’s starting to fall out of his neat coiffure, whereas Blaine’s gel-helmet looks as immaculate as ever—and Sam is dating Santana. Which is fine. It’s not like the two of them ever went out. Well, if they’d sang that duet together—

But they hadn’t. So they didn’t. Which is fine. It looks like their lives are all going well.

The moment the door closes behind Blaine, the tears begin to flow thick and fast. Kurt makes little cooing noises that sound almost birdlike in his high, clear voice. “Hey,” he says. “It’s all right. It’ll be all right, Sam.”

And slowly, in dribs and drabs, Sam confesses it all. His dad losing his job. Quitting the basketball team. Not knowing how to explain why he’s tired all the time to his teachers, to Mr. Schue, why he’s been fumbling dance steps and missing notes. It seems sometimes like Glee is the only part of his day he looks forward to left, and he can only go because Stevie and Stacey’s school lets out an hour after his. Kurt listens, and nods in all the right places, and offers Sam tissues from a tissue box lavishly decorated with the face of one of Kurt’s Broadway idols crying lovely, pearlescent stage tears.

“And I gotta be strong, you know,” Sam says, after the worst of the blubbering is done. “My little brother and sister—they don’t know what’s going on. They think it’s all a big adventure right now. And as long as I stay strong, as long as I don’t let on what’s really going on, they’ll keep thinking that. I just… I just don’t want them to remember this part of their life and feel like I didn’t step up.”

“What are their names?” Kurt asks softly.

“Stacey’s littlest. Then there’s Stevie,” Sam says dully. 

“Stacey,” Kurt says contemplatively. “That’s pretty. It’s from the Greek, you know. Anastasia.”

Sam wipes at his eyes. Kurt’s voice is soothing, nonjudgmental. Just laying out facts like it’ll calm Sam down, and weirdly, it does. Sam comes back to himself enough to feel embarrassed again, but when he looks Kurt is just looking at him steadily, not mocking, not embarrassed on his behalf. He smiles at him kindly, even. “Like the Disney princess,” Sam says after a moment.

“Anastasia actually wasn’t—” Kurt sighs, seems to think better of it. “Yes. Like the Disney princess.”

Sam looks dully at the stack of pizzas by the door. Blaine had taken the one meant for him and Kurt, but there are others, getting cold. “I’m gonna get fired,” he realizes bleakly.

Kurt stands, heads to his wallet, and pulls out four twenties—enough to pay for the whole stack of pizzas. “Don’t worry about it,” he says, waving off Sam’s protests. “I get paid by my dad to work in the shop and not complain about the mechanics’ uniforms. I have enough.”

It ought to feel like charity. If it were anyone else, it would feel like charity. But this is Kurt, who gave up singing their duet just so Sam wouldn’t get teased, this is Kurt, who was run out of town by Dave fucking Karofsky, this is Kurt, who knows well what pity feels like and has looked at him with none of it all night. 

He takes the bills gingerly. Kurt smiles at him. “Thanks. We’ll have a midnight midterm pizza party. The guys here will love me for it.” Sam nods unsteadily. Kurt bites his lip. Sam tries not to look. “And Sam… listen. If you ever want company babysitting, you can text me, okay?”

“Okay,” Sam whispers, grateful that Kurt didn’t phrase it as _free babysitting,_ grateful that Kurt seems to instinctively dance around the line. Helplessly grateful that Kurt knows, he _knows_ now, and Sam still feels like a _person_ around him.

“Okay,” Kurt says back, and walks him out to his car. It’s a beat-up old sedan; really his dad’s car, but when his dad rolls back into the motel driveway after a day looking for work, it’s Sam’s for the night. Kurt places a hand on his shoulder, gentle, lingering. He looks at Sam nervously—for what, Sam doesn’t know—then reaches over and gives him a hug. Sam falls into it. He’s the one who gives bedtime hugs now, and Santana’s… not much of a hugger. He can’t remember the last time arms wrapped around him with no expectation, just the simple act of affection and warmth. Probably it was before his dad lost his job.

“See you around, Sam,” Kurt murmurs into his ear, and the feeling of his breath lingers on Sam’s cheek long after he’s driven away.  
  
  
  
Rachel throws a party. “Go, Sam,” his mother says, and so he goes.

Quinn is there.

Kurt is there, but so is Blaine. Kurt smiles at him, but not any more than he did when they were at McKinley together, and Sam takes it for what it is: _I won’t bring it up if you won’t._ Sam watches with a dreamy sort of disinterest as Santana does body shots off of Brittany. He blinks on as Rachel crawls across the floor to Blaine, still licking the taste of Brittany’s strawberry lip gloss off of his own lips. Girls taste so… fruity. It’s nice. Quinn is still the only girl he’s ever been attracted to—Santana is beautiful, and Marian was lovely, but he hasn’t had to think of locker room funk smell all evening and Santana’s basically been riding his lap—but he bets every single one of them _tastes_ delicious.

It’s Puck’s turn next, and he’s barely even paying attention to the bottle, chugging instead straight from one of Rachel’s dads’ bottles, as the empty wine cooler bottle slows and slows and… points at Sam.

Sam’s heart stops.

Rachel giggles. “Spin again, Puck,” she says.

Puck scowls. “I ain’t no pussy,” he says. “I’m here for some girl-on-girl, if I have to mack on another dude to see it, I’m down with that.”

Rachel doesn’t seem to know what to make of that. Swaying, she tips her head toward Sam. “Sam?”

“Uh-uh,” Santana cuts in. “No way. Puck stole Brittany away from me for like, two months after I let them make out during Spin the Bottle. Not again. _No me fucking gusta._ ”

Sam leans back, a little relieved. “The lady has spoken,” he says, and Puck shrugs, spins again, and plants one on Tina. Sam kisses Rachel (she tastes like pink), Lauren, and Brittany again that night, after which Santana claims his lap and keeps him too busy making out to worry about the cheers and groans going on next to him as the game continues.

He offers to drive her home, but she rolls her eyes, says, “You couldn’t handle Lima Heights, white boy,” and hops the door into her bright red convertible with Brittany giggling on her arm. Sam has dropped his door key and is fumbling around on Rachel’s hard-packed driveway when out of nowhere a hand comes down on his ass and gives it a smack. Sam jolts upright, banging his head on one of the rearview mirrors.

Puck is grinning at him. He doesn’t look drunk. He doesn’t look any different than usual, his arms crossed as he leans back against the side of Rachel’s house, biceps angle to bulge most attractively. “Careful,” he says. “Wouldn’t want anyone to think you’re gay.”

Sam scowls at him. “I’m not a coward, dude.”

“Nah,” Puck scoffs. “A coward would be if you _were_ gay and were too scared to come out.” Sam flushes. He knows he’s a dark blusher, but he’s hoping the shadows of the night will conceal the blood swimming to his face. “I think you’re just homophobic.”

“Screw you, Puck,” Sam snaps. “I didn’t see Karofsky giving you a black eye for standing up for Kurt.”

Puck shrugged. “Probation,” he says easily. “What, you think you’re tougher than me?”

“Yeah,” Sam says, feeling brave and reckless. “Yeah, I do.”

“Prove it,” Puck says, and leans forward and kisses him.

And it’s like—

Fireworks, exploding behind his eyelids. Kissing Quinn had _never_ felt like this. Puck grins into his mouth, a wolf-grin of a smile, and drags him forward, his fingers in his belt loops, tilting his face, deepening the kiss. His tongue licks out and drags across the seam of Sam’s mouth, and, startled, Sam opens for him, feeling Puck’s tongue flicking teasingly across his own, plunge into the hot wetness of his mouth, and then withdraw, teasing lightly at his lips again. Sam whimpers. Puck kisses him and kisses him and kisses him, kisses him like he’s drinking him down, kisses him like he’s breathing him, in, fast and slow, deep sucking kisses and quick darting kisses and then sucking on his bottom lip like candy dissolving on his tongue and Sam can’t breathe, he can’t breathe—

Puck pulls back, gasping for breath, and Sam realizes dazedly that he can’t breathe because they’ve been kissing for so long. Puck looks surprised, and contemplative. “Huh,” he says, licking his own lips. “Not bad. Want to do that again?”

Sam shoves him away and clambers into his car, but his heart doesn’t slow for a long, long time. 


	2. only me beside you (still, you're not alone)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for a brief mention of suicidal ideation.

“When we kissed,” Blaine says, “it… it felt _good._ ”

Kurt’s stomach drops. He doesn’t know why he’s so upset about this, only that he _is,_ and somehow Rachel Berry is _still_ ruining his life even though he no longer goes to the same school with her and only sees her once a week for their scheduled taped musical marathon. “It felt _good_ because you were _drunk,_ ” he says, slowly, in case Blaine needs the extra time to process. Blaine is younger than him, sure, but does he really need to explain how alcohol works? 

Blaine shrugs, like he really doesn’t understand what the big deal is. “What’s the harm in going out on one crummy little date?”

“You’re _gay,_ Blaine,” Kurt hisses.

“I… _thought_ I was, but…!” Kurt watches with an open mouth as the foundation he’s built his entire life at Dalton upon crumbles. Blaine laughs, a little embarrassed sound in the back of his throat that Kurt used to find charming. He glances around. It’s still Ohio, even if it is Dalton. “I’ve… never even had a boyfriend before.”

 _And whose fault is that?_ Kurt wants to explode. If Blaine wants _experience,_ Kurt is right there, Kurt’s been _throwing_ himself at him for months now, Kurt doesn’t even mind being a teenage fling, Kurt won’t care when Blaine says “I think we should just be friends,” he just wants a _kiss,_ he just wants someone to _hold hands with_ , no matter for how brief a time. “Isn’t this the time that you’re supposed to… figure stuff out?” Blaine asks.

“I can’t believe that I’m hearing this right now,” Kurt says, out loud, more to convince himself of the reality of the situation than anything else. The second boy he’s ever loved, and he’s losing him to Rachel Berry. _Again._

“Maybe I’m bi,” Blaine says with a faint smile on his face. “I don’t know.”

“Bisexual’s a term that gay guys in high school use when they want to hold hands with girls and feel like a normal person for a change!” Kurt snaps. He’s not even really sure if he believes that. But in his own experience, you just _know._ Like Finn just _knew_ he wasn’t gay, that he’d never be able to return Kurt’s feelings. You _know_ who you’re attracted to, and you spend your whole life denying it, or you—you get kissed in a locker room by a boy you hate and then flee the school after you get death threats—who would _choose_ to be this way? If you could be anything but, if you were attracted to women, who would _choose_ the bullying Blaine has endured, that Kurt has endured?

Doesn’t Blaine get that Kurt has wished he were straight too, a thousand times, a million times? Doesn’t Blaine _get_ that it’s impossible?

“Whoa, whoa, wait, wait,” Blaine says. “Why are you so angry?”

“Because I look up to you!” Kurt cries out, frustrated. _Because I ran away from my school for you. Because I told you I’m into you and you’ve been smiling at me and touching my hand and then you went and kissed Rachel and now you’re talking about going on a date with her, which is farther than we’ve_ ever _gotten!_ “I admire how proud you are of who you are! I know what it’s like to be in the closet, and here you are, about to tiptoe back in!”

Or worse. Or throw aside the closet entirely because he’s really not gay.

“I’m—I’m really sorry if this hurts your _feelings_ or your _pride_ or whatever, but however… _confusing_ it might be for you, it’s actually a lot more confusing for me.” Kurt bites his lip. He’s not actually sure that’s possible, and Blaine had talked about his date with Rachel with such lightness, such playfulness. “You’re 100% sure who you are. _Fantastic._ Well, maybe we can’t all be so lucky.”

_Lucky._

Lucky I’m in love with my best friend.

Numbly, he says something back about _luck._ And then Blaine compares him to Karofsky. And then he’s gone.

Kurt stares at his coffee for a long time, wondering if he’s just lost the only gay friend he’s ever had. Because his gay friend doesn’t want to be gay anymore.

He’s so fucking lonely.

“Kurt?” says a familiar baritone. Kurt looks up. Sam is there, fidgeting, in a plaid shirt and jeans. He looks good, Kurt notices, but also nervous. “Hey,” Sam says. “Can we talk?”  
  
  
  
“It’s about the party,” Sam says. His fingers are tapping nervously on the mocha Kurt bought for him. (Kurt figures that if he’s paying, he decides what everyone drinks, and Sam looks like he could use the sweet boost of chocolate.)

“That stupid party,” Kurt sighs. Sam looks nervous again.

“Maybe I should go,” he mumbles.

Kurt sighs, places a hand over Sam’s hand, says, “No… I’m just in a bad mood. Blaine and I had a fight. Please. When I said you could come to me for anything, I meant it.”

Sam smiles at him tentatively. “It’s not about… my family situation, though,” he says. “It’s just… I don’t know anyone else who would know about this. But you. And you’re so…”

Kurt waits to hear the words, wearily.

“…brave,” Sam says, and Kurt starts breathing again.

“I’m really not,” Kurt breathes out, but smiles at Sam anyway. “What is it you wanted to talk about?”

“Puck kissed me,” Sam says, and Kurt stops breathing again.

White noise fills his ears. That was _not_ what he was expecting Sam to say.

He can’t help but picture it, and because it’s Puck, it goes graphic almost immediately; Puck’s hand under Sam’s rucked-up shirt, the two of them writing against each other. Kurt battles down his erection fiercely. The last thing he needs is to get a boner while Sam is telling him—telling him—what?

“I mean,” Sam says, “I kind of dared him. And I. I kissed back.”

Oh. Straight boy confusion. Kurt can deal with this, though it hurts his heart. “It’s all right,” Kurt says comfortingly. “It’s just… the feeling of someone’s lips against yours… lips are lips, right?” Not that he’d ever know. He’s only been kissed once, and it doesn’t count, he tells himself. It doesn’t. “It’s a physical reaction. It doesn’t mean anything.”

Sam runs a hand through his hair. “No. I’m. I’m not explaining this right. I kissed Puck, Kurt, and it… it wasn’t like kissing Quinn. I’ve always. Guys have always been.”

Kurt’s pulse is high. His heart taps against his chest, a Rachel Berry tap-dance beat. “Sam,” he says slowly, “what are you saying.”

“I thought. When I met Quinn. For the first time, I felt that way about a girl. But it was different with Puck. Kurt,” Sam looks at him with huge beseeching eyes. “I thought maybe with Quinn, I was. I don’t know. Cured. But now—”

The second time someone brings up bisexuality that day, Kurt is the one who storms out.  
  
  
  
“Hey!” Kurt shouts across the parking lot. Puck raises an eyebrow and gestures for Kurt to join him. Kurt stalks over, color high in his cheeks, fists clenched, ready to do battle. He’ll lose, of course. He’s never won against Puck before, back in the bad old days of being dumpstered every morning. But this is worth it.

He waits until he’s in hissing range, though. Sam’s privacy is still worth something. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Kurt snaps. “Messing with Sam’s head like that?”

Puck’s face goes very still. “He told you,” he says.

“Oh, don’t worry, your reputation is intact, archaic seventeenth-century concept that it is,” Kurt snaps. “It’s not like _I’m_ going to tell anyone, or that anyone would believe me even if I did.” He’d kept Karofsky’s secret, hadn’t he? Not that Puck would know about that, he’s kept it so well. Jealous old gay hag, spreading rumors, is what they’d say. Can’t get the two hottest boys in school to get after his ass, so he’s trying to ruin them. “Leave Sam alone. He’s having a hard enough time without you barging in with your clumsy ham-handsiness and making it worse.”

“Has it ever occurred to you,” Puck said steadily, “that I like him? You ought to try it sometime. Going after someone that you actually like.”

“I—” Kurt sputters. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I mean we all saw the way you were looking at that Blaine kid last night,” Puck says. “Didn’t think he was your type. I thought you liked the football players. Finn, the duets thing with Sam. These guns.”

“I’ve never been into you, Puck.”

“Why?” Puck sounds strangely offended. “I’m hot. The point is… are you sure you’re not just crushing on him because he’s the first other gay dude you ever met?”

The question hits him like a lightning bolt. He’s never. He’s never thought of that before. It’s true he doesn’t think longingly of the curve of Blaine’s jawline, like he had with Finn and Sam; he’d seen Blaine shirtless before, and though it was nice, it didn’t set him on _fire_ the way the muscle mags under his bed did. He feels about Blaine like.

Like the way he feels about Mercedes, or Quinn. They are objectively beautiful. But.

But the way he feels about losing Blaine to Rachel… it doesn’t feel like losing Finn to Rachel. It feels like. Like throwing the diva-off. Like knowing you _deserve something,_ that something is _in your grasp,_ and feeling it slip away. Letting it slip away. Not because you’re not good enough, but because there are other things that are more important.

“I like Blaine,” Kurt says. It sounds unconvincing to his own ears.

“Mmhmm.” Puck kicks at the fence. It rattles.

“What are you doing here, anyway?” Kurt asks. It had been the first place he’d looked for Puck, but it’s a while after school let out, and he doesn’t even know why he’d pointed his Nav toward the school anyway, isn’t sure how to feel about his apparent innate Puck-finding sense.

Puck shrugs. “Not going home before my first pool-cleaning appointment,” he says. “Did you really come all the way over from Westerville just to yell at me?” He sounds flattered, not angry. Kurt crosses his arms and gloomily realizes that if he’s not attracted to Blaine or himself, he can hardly expect Puck or Sam— _whatever’s_ going on with them—to choose him over each other.

“Do you believe in bisexuals?” he asks instead.

“Is that where you have the multiple personalities?” Puck asks. Kurt gives him a Look and he busts out laughing. “Kidding, kidding. Are you asking me if _I’m_ bisexual, Hummel?”

Kurt shrugs. “I guess I am,” he says. “I’ve never met someone who liked women more than you, Puck. But… if you really like Sam…”

“I don’t believe in labels,” Puck says. “Sure, I’ve had a few gay experiences. But Sam’s cool. He’s chill and he didn’t laugh at me about the Port-a-Potty thing, and have you _seen_ those lips?” Kurt picks at his cuticles, a little embarrassed to hear his own thoughts about Sam echoed out loud. Is this what attraction is? Puck’s voice softens a little when he says, “And I know you’ve heard him sing.”

“Yeah,” Kurt says, and feels a strange kinship… with Puck, of all people, which is weird, but still not the weirdest thing to happen to him today.

“Hey, Kurt,” Puck says, “you know you’re my boy, right?”

At last, Kurt smiles. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I know.”  
  
  
  
It’s too late for coffee now, so he sits on his stoop and waits for Sam to pull up in his dad’s beat-up old sedan. Mud cakes the tires, and with that kind of upkeep, the oil probably needs changing, not to mention a dozen other minor but essential things to keep the car running until the end of its life; Kurt thinks idly about recommending a good mechanic, or at least a car wash. Sam pulls up to the curb and walks warily out. He doesn’t say anything, just stops on the sidewalk and watches Kurt, who’s swinging his legs where he’s sitting on the porch, where it drops down to earth.

“Hey,” Kurt says, and then, “sit.”

Sam sits down on the porch steps next to him. “So,” he says.

“Sorry about earlier,” Kurt says. “I… I’m _really_ sorry. I shouldn’t have reacted like that. You were trying to tell me something important, and I was… wrapped up in my own relationship issues.”

Sam’s expression clears with the apology. “S’ok,” he mumbles. “I know I… I only came to you because. ‘Cause you’re the only gay guy I know. Wasn’t really fair of me either. I coulda just Googled it.”

“’I kissed a boy and I liked it’?” Kurt quips. Sam flinches. Right. Too soon. “I. I haven’t, by the way. So I’m not really the expert on this that you were expecting.” Kissed a boy _and_ liked it, he means. Karofsky doesn’t count. Karofsky doesn’t count.

Sam tilts his head in a way that, weirdly, reminds him of a dog perking its ears up. “But I thought… that guy in your room…”

“Blaine and I are just friends,” Kurt sighs. “And it’s looking more and more likely that that’s all we’ll ever be. I… just because you’re attracted to men doesn’t mean you find all men attractive. He might like a Gap employee at the mall, and not me. _You_ might like Puck, and not me. In case you’re wondering if not being into me means you’re not gay.”

Sam’s ears go red. He ducks his head. “Yeah,” he mumbles. “I dunno if I like Puck. I don’t really know much of anything right now.”

“That’s okay,” Kurt says kindly. “You can take your time with this, you know. You can even push it down and not act on it until you move out of this one-horse town. I’d understand. Believe me, if I could… I might have.”

He thinks about Blaine. _You can take your time with this,_ he’s telling Sam, and… shouldn’t he give Blaine the same courtesy? To figure out whether he wants to be straight, or even, god forbid… bisexual? “Can I ask you something?” Kurt says.

“Yeah,” Sam says, “anything.”

“Did you really feel something with Quinn?”

“I—” Sam struggles. “Quinn was the first girl I ever kissed. You know that phrase, ‘hot and bothered’? When she was kissing me, I. I’d get hot. And bothered. I would have to like, try _really_ hard not to… you know.”

Kurt quirks an eyebrow. “Say I don’t know.”

“Blow my top,” Sam blurts out, and Kurt flushes.

“Oh,” he says faintly, and does his very best not to picture Sam’s dick from his vague memories of ending their duet in the shower room. “And Puck?” Kurt asks gently.

“It was different,” Sam says. “I wanted to, like. Pin him to the ground and fight with him, I wanted to get his blood up, I wanted to… to grab his dick and shut him up and watch him. You know. Come.” Oh god. Oh Gaga. Kurt is _not_ going to pop a stiffy sitting here on the porch with a confused heteroflexible football player, he is _not._ He crosses his legs. There. “Is that… is it possible to like guys and girls, but in like, different ways?”

“I don’t know, Sam,” Kurt says. “I’m figuring it out, too. Have you tried singing about it?” he asks, and Sam snorts.

They sit in silence for a moment. Around them, crickets begin to sing, but not in an awkward way. The evening is approaching, and the sun grows heavy with twilight over the houses. Kurt’s hard-on goes down with a few deep breaths and meditative techniques.

“Hey,” he says, “when was the last time you or your dad changed the oil on that car?”

Sam looks confused. “Changed the what?”

“Oh god,” Kurt says, “come on. We’re going to my dad’s garage. I’ll give you a tune-up.”

“Kurt, I don’t think—”

“Please,” he says, because in spite of the mechanic/customer porn he’s tried watching exactly once, nothing is unsexier than getting sweaty and greasy in the garage. His version of Coach Beiste, he suspects, is imagining building an engine from the suspension up. “Do it for me. I’ll feel like hell if you skid off a rainy road one night because no one’s checked your brake pads since you bought that car.”

“…Okay,” Sam says, and stands. He helps Kurt to his feet. His hand is very warm and very large in Kurt’s own. Neither lets go right away.  
  
  
  
He apologizes to Blaine the next day. Blaine looks uncomfortable, but accepts his apology with a sigh and a shake of the head. “I hate fighting with you,” Kurt confesses, and Blaine gives him a tiny smile.

“So how was your date with Rachel?” Kurt asks, trying to return to normality. God, it really is Finn all over again. He wonders if he can pull the makeover trick a second time.

“I don’t know,” Blaine says, and isn’t that just the theme of the day.  
  
  
  
It turns out Blaine is gay. Kurt can’t summon the well of enthusiasm that would have once overwhelmed him at the thought.  
  
  
  
He and Sam continue to hang out. They don’t always talk about being gay, or maybe bisexual. They talk about Glee. They talk about Stacey and Stevie. Kurt shows Sam how to change the oil in his car.

“Every six months? Really?” Sam sounds doubtful.

“Really. Or your car will catch _on fire,”_ Kurt jokes, but he sort of thinks Sam believes him?

But some of the time they talk about being gay. Or bisexual.

“When did you decide to come out?” Sam asks him.

Kurt, leaning against the hood of his Nav in the parking lot of the pizza place where Sam works as a delivery guy and waiting for his triple-pepperoni order to come out of the oven, shrugs. “It was just to Mercedes at first,” Kurt says. “She had a crush on me.”

Sam chokes on his slice of Hawaiian (devil food). “Really?” he gasps when he’s swallowed, saving Kurt from having to Heimlich him back into sense. “But she seems so… sensible.”

“Hey,” Kurt says, mock-offended. “Ladies love me. I’m nonthreatening and will do their nails for them for free.”

“You’re right,” Sam laughs. “I’m sorry.”

“Anyway, when I told her I was in love with Rachel, she busted the window of my car—this very one—” he taps against the windshield with his knuckles— “and then, well, I _had_ to tell her. And after that… I love her, but once it’s out of the bag, it’s out of the bag. I told my dad the week after. And then I just stopped denying it. It’s not like Puck or Karofsky or any of them ever believed me when I said I wasn’t gay, anyway.”

Sam chews his pizza thoughtfully. He looks at his hands when the slice is finished. “Would you,” he says softly, “think less of me? If I decided I was gay, or bisexual, and then… never came out?”

Once upon a time, he would have. Now, Kurt shakes his head and says, “I would want you to be happy, Samuel. Whatever that looks like for you.”  
  
  
  
That Friday, he gets a text from Santana. “PARKING LOT OF BREADSTIX. 7:30. PICK UP ORDER #374.”  
  
  
  
A little concerned he’s going to get mugged, he goes anyway. Order #374 is alfredo linguine, a Caesar salad with bacon (Kurt’s usual, and should he be concerned than Santana knows it or impressed?), and the Breadstix special “spaghetti-on-a-stick.” He’s brings the heavy brown paper bag back to his car, sticks it in the passenger seat, and waits. Sure enough, Santana is soon clambering into the back of his car.

What he doesn’t expect is Sam, who looks as confused as Kurt feels, entering through the other side. “What,” Kurt says, “is going on.”

“Hand over the linguine, bitch,” Santana snaps, and, because Kurt likes the number of orifices he has, he gives her the linguine (that _he_ bought and paid for, by the way, so it should really be _his_ linguine—not that he’s ever going to tell her that).

“Seriously, Santana,” Kurt says. “Are we staging a coup? Are we going to kill Figgins? Why is Sam here?”

“Trouty Mouth is here because I told him I would let him feel me up under the skirt if he came,” Santana said. “Although I don’t think that’s _really_ why he’s here. Do you?”

And she gives Kurt such a penetrating look that he gets her implication all at once. “Wha—I’m not trying to steal your boyfriend, Santana!” he squeaks. So this is how his life ends.

“Oh, I know,” Santana says. “I don’t get Caesar salad and bacon bits for people who try to steal my boyfriend.” ( _I_ got the Caesar salad and bacon bits, Kurt thinks mutinously.) “I just cut them. No, I’m here because he’s trying to _get_ himself stolen. By you.”

Kurt laughs. Sam doesn’t.

“Santana,” he hisses, and his face is red and blotchy and he looks like he’s going to cry and at once Kurt _gets it,_ why Sam has been spending so much time with him, why _Kurt_ was the first and only person he went to when the whole Puck thing happened, and it feels like the sun is dawning over him, it feels like the moment in _Next to Normal_ when Natalie turns on the light.

“Really?” he breaths, and Sam turns to him, miserable and unable to meet his eye, and without thinking Kurt reaches forward and tips Sam’s chin up so their eyes meet, and Sam looks so _sad_ —

“Ahem,” Santana says, and Kurt jerks backward. Oh, god, he just felt up Santana Lopez’s boyfriend in front of her. So _this_ is how his life ends. “Partly I called you here to see if the feeling was mutual. Clearly, it is.”

“Santana—”

“The second reason I called you here is to tell you that you can have him.”

“I—what?”

“What?” Sam echoes. Instead of looking offended, he looks… hopeful. Kurt’s heart beats a fluttery tattoo against his breastbone.

Santana slurps at her linguine. “I’ve tasted the rainbow, Hummel. Seen everything the eighth wonder of the world— _those lips_ —have to offer. I’m ready to trade up for a newer model.”

“So why not just dump me?” Sam says, half warily, half mortified. Kurt empathizes. This whole conversation is _very surreal._

Santana grins a shark-grin. “Because I believe in _giving back._ I’m running for Prom Queen, Hummel, and I’m not going to lie, getting dumped for a guy is great political fodder. Would make a hell of a sympathy vote-getter.”

“You are _not_ going to out Sam,” Kurt snaps protectively. He’ll die, but he’ll go down defending Sam and his right to privacy with his last breath.

“No,” Santana says, “of course not. Now, if you _choose_ to come out, my little fish-lipped former lover,” she says to Sam, “I wouldn’t be against that. But this isn’t really about Sam. It’s about _you._ ”

“Me?” Kurt asks, surprised.

“Yes, you. I’m giving you a reason to come back to McKinley, Hummel. A good reason. A better one than the fact that we’re going to crush you at Regionals, but if you come back, and help us _win_ Nationals—well, so much the better. Then even Quinn and Finn would have to vote for me.” There’s a fanatical light in her eyes. Kurt has never been more frightened in his life, and he’s received death threats. Santana finishes her linguine. “I’ll leave you to tenderly stare into your eyes and stroke each other’s faces, or whatever gay guys do. Think about it, Hummel. And vote Santana.”

And with a flash of red miniskirt, she’s out of his Nav, and Sam is staring at him, dumbfounded, those beautiful lips parted with surprise, and Kurt is—Kurt is—

“Sam,” Kurt says, “Sam, what are you feeling? Right now?”

“Terrified,” Sam whispers.

“Yes, good,” Kurt says. “Me too,” and then he leans forward and kisses him.  
  
  
  
“Since when?” Kurt laughs.

“Since you cornered me at my locker and told me you wanted to do a duet with me,” Sam says shyly, playing with Kurt’s fingers. Every now and then he sweeps his index finger across Kurt’s palm, and Kurt shudders with pleasure and electric current. He’s driven them out to make-out point, but they’re not making out—or they did, a little, but now they’ve leaned their chairs back and are just talking to each other in the dark, lit by only the stars.

“You’re lying,” Kurt says, though it’s a sweet lie and he’s flattered.

“No, really. I, uh. I have a thing for eyes. And yours are…”

Sam props himself up on his elbow and stares at Kurt intently, causing him to flush and look away. Kurt fumbles, “Well, my eyes _are_ one of my best features.”

Sam picks up his hand again and presses a kiss to it and smiles. “One of many excellent features. Your turn. Since when?”

“Since I saw you and your dye job,” Kurt sighed. “I know better than to crush on straight guys, but when I saw that platinum blonde… I had hope.”

“Straight guys dye their hair,” Sam says, sounding as though he’s trying to convince himself as much as Kurt.

“Not that color, they don’t,” Kurt says. “So we’ve been pining for each other for months.”

“I wouldn’t say _pining_ ,” Sam hedges. 

“I’ve been pining for you,” Kurt whispers.

Sam grins and says, “Okay, pining,” and kisses him.

That night they talk about everything, before Kurt finally drives Sam home and then tucks himself into bed. They talk about astronomy, they talk about each other’s lives—dead mothers, rambunctious siblings—they talk about the crick in Sam’s back he’s gotten from sleeping on the motel couch, they talk about Dalton and Karofsky, and Kurt whispers a secret he’s never told anyone before in Sam’s ear while swearing him to silence. They talk about coming out, and when Sam struggles for words, when he says, “I’ll—I, I _will_ —for you—” Kurt kisses his forehead and says, “You don’t have to, okay? I’m happy just to date in secret for now. You don’t have to for me. When you do it, you do it for you. Okay?” and Sam looks so relieved and so ashamed and Kurt kisses both looks away, reveling that this boy would even dare to consider throwing so much away for this relationship of one night.

They talk about music.

It is music, the soft strains of “A Very Nice Prince,” that accompany him as he drives home, his grin stretching his face, the speeding car turning the streetlights into streaks of color against his windshield and windows.  
  
  
  
It’s not like Kurt hasn’t fantasized about what his first date would be like. A movie, Breadstix, maybe a quickly snuck kiss on the doorstep as he’s dropped off. But Sam and Kurt are dating in private for the moment, and Sam can’t afford any of that besides. So for their first date, Kurt puts in his old DVD of _Into the Woods_ , Bernadette Peters’s turn as the Witch, and snuggles up against Sam on the loveseat in his bedroom. (Sam cries when the Baker’s Wife dies. Kurt falls a little more in love right there.)

Then they bake dinner rolls, and while the bread is proofing Sam sweeps him into his arms and says, “We’re doing original songs in Glee,” and hums to himself, a little nonsense tune that turns into “Giants in the Sky” as he sways back and forth with Kurt, Kurt giggling and trying his hardest not to be maneuvered into stepping on Sam’s toes. Sam dips him, and Kurt wonders dazedly how he could have ever been in love with a boy who can’t dance.

When the dancing dies down into gentle swaying, back and forth, their conversation turns from music theory (that is, Kurt nattering on about chords and progressions, and Sam nodding alone and making thoughtful noises and absolutely not incorporating any of Kurt’s Very Big Thoughts into his own original piece in any way) to what exactly you can stuff in a dinner roll. They’re getting wild when the rolls are ready to be popped out of the oven—”fish sticks and mayonnaise,” Sam had just said—and Kurt looks at the trays of dinner rolls and, like, it’s just occurred to him, says, “Well, _we_ can’t eat all of this, even with Finn’s help. You’ll have to take a tray back to the motel.”

Sam kisses him when he leaves, a sweet brush of the lips, his arms laden with a basket full of dinner rolls (”Little Blonde,” Kurt calls him affectionately) but Kurt can feel his hard-on pressing into his hip when he goes.

It’s the most perfect afternoon Kurt can imagine.  
  
  
  
Kurt starts buying Sam coffee. They don’t see each other very often. On days when he works, Sam goes nocturnal: he naps right after school and then delivers pizza all night, doing his homework in the car between call-outs. But the mornings after, Kurt gets him an iced coffee to wake him up. They meet at the Lima Bean and Kurt hands him a coffee to power him through the end of Sam’s day as Kurt starts his own. 

On one of these occasions, Sam enters, frustrated, clutching a copy of the new-old school paper, the _Muckracker._ Kurt knows it’s a reference to twentieth-century investigative reporters, but the actual content is as ugly as the name suggests. Sam thrusts the blind items page at Kurt, who skims past the rumor that Santana is a lesbian to find—

“Oh, Sam,” Kurt says sympathetically.

“She was just dropping off my homework from when I had to miss school to take Stacey to the doctor,” Sam mumbles into his coffee.

Kurt reaches out and takes his hand—a risk, but he doesn’t see anyone he recognizes in their immediate surroundings. Sam gratefully squeezes back. “Were you worried I’d think you were cheating?” he asks humorously.

Sam shrugs his shoulders, uncomfortable. “It seems to be all anyone ever talks about.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about me,” Kurt says sweetly. “I… I know about your circumstances, Sam, and I don’t care. I know you might need your ex to drop off your homework sometimes. I only wish…” He doesn’t finish the thought. He wishes it could be _him_ dropping off Sam’s homework, but they don’t go to the same school anymore, and wishes and horses and all that. Kurt slurps from his iced mocha. “If I were you, though, I’d be worried about Finn.”

“Why?” Sam sighs.

“ _He_ doesn’t know about your family situation. And he’s not going to take kindly to the accusation, not after… what Quinn did to him last year.” Sam moans and buries his face in his arms.  
  
  
  
_Why_ is Kurt always right?  
  
  
  
When he gets out of the car at Dalton the next morning, Finn and Rachel are waiting for him. He pauses. “Are you here to steal our half of the sectionals trophy?” Kurt teases gently, though his stomach is churning at the anxious expressions on their faces. “Because while that might be a blow, don’t think it’ll save you tomorrow.”

Finn takes a step toward him. “Kurt—” he says, and then words fail him.

“Are you okay?” Kurt asks, concern bubbling to the surface. He goes to grasp Finn’s elbows. Finn looks into his face, dumbly, helplessly, and Kurt squeezes. “Is it Dad? Or Carole? What’s going on?”

“Kurt,” Rachel, bless her forever, butts in, “are you… are you seeing Sam?”

He takes back the blessing. Two weeks. It has been _two weeks._

They couldn’t even keep a secret for two weeks.

Kurt laughs, high and false, and knows that’s a confirmation in Rachel’s keen, hungry eyes. “Why would you say that?”

“We saw you, man,” Finn says through gritted teeth. “Coming out of a motel room with him. He hugged you.”

 _At least you didn’t see what happened before that_ , Kurt thinks wildly, which was that they’d put Stevie and Stacey to bed and Kurt had popped on a bootleg of _Jesus Christ Superstar,_ thinking that Sam might enjoy a more creative take on his faith, and then they’d made out through all the bits that weren’t singing. “I was helping him with his homework,” Kurt lies, though Sam has always been a solid B student until recently, and Kurt has no way of explaining how he even knows about Sam’s drop in grades due to his pizza delivery job.

“Uh-huh,” Finn says, unconvinced.

“I—why were _you_ outside that motel?” Kurt splutters.

“We were staking it out,” Rachel chirps up. “Waiting for Quinn.”

Finn elbows her, but Kurt’s mouth has already dropped open. “Oh my god, Finn, couldn’t you just _ask_ her?”

“You can’t just ask a girl if she’s cheating on you,” Finn mumbles. “I found that out the hard way.”

“ _With Quinn,”_ Kurt says, exasperation laying heavy on his shoulders. “Finn, you’re my brother and I love you, but don’t take your insecurities out on Sam, all right?” _He has enough to be going on with_ , Kurt almost says, and though it’s true, it’s also too revealing.

“Kurt,” Rachel says, “what about Blaine?”

Blaine? Kurt almost laughs. Blaine hasn’t leaned in to steal a single kiss since Kurt confessed his feelings to him on _Valentine’s Day_ , months ago. Blaine would rather see where things go with Rachel than with Kurt. Blaine is the first other gay guy Kurt ever met, and while that still means something, it means less now than it used to. So he merely turns and stalks inside, his messenger bag thumping behind him as he leaves Holmes and Watson, that fantastic pair, in the parking lot staring after him.

And that should be the end of it. Except it’s not.

Kurt gets to his room and Pavarotti is—

Sniffling, red-eyed, Kurt lets himself into the Warblers meeting room to deliver the news. He wants to sing “Blackbird.” There’s shouting that stops as he comes in, and he wonders vaguely why he wasn’t invited to this meeting, or if he just missed the summons in all the… commotion. “Kurt,” Blaine says, and the look on his face is a mask of inscrutability. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s Pavarotti,” Kurt chokes out. “Pavarotti is… dead. I suspect a stroke.”

“Oh my God,” Blaine says, “I’m so sorry,” but the mumbling of Warblers almost drowns him out.

“I know it’s really stupid to be upset about a bird, but… h-he inspired me, with his optimism, and his love of song. He was my friend.” Kurt brushes at his eyes. Badly, he wishes that Sam were there with him, his arm around his shoulders, tucking his face into the crook of his neck so he can cry without seeing the blank, staring faces of the Warblers boring back into him. “I—I hoped to be able to sing a lament—”

“Kurt,” Wes says, and Kurt stops.

“While we know this must be hard for you,” David says, slowly, “it’s actually made our jobs easier. Junior Member Trent was in the parking lot this morning, and he… overheard your conversation with your step-brother and the Berry girl.”

“What?” Kurt asks, dazed at the conversational turn. He’d come here to celebrate Pavarotti… what does Finn have to do with it?

“Is it true,” Thad says, “that you are in a relationship with a member of the New Directions?”

“I—” He struggles for words. No, he should say. No, is the only thing to say. Sam’s not ready to come out, and he has to respect that, even if none of the people know Sam personally, even if they’re staring at him with all the gravitas that implies this will be the most important question he ever answers in his high school career. Blaine looks at him, and in his gaze he can see him pleading for Kurt to tell the truth. “No,” he finally says, but his voice cracks on the denial.

Wes and David exchange looks. Blaine looks down at his feet. “I wish you’d just admitted it, Kurt,” Thad sighs. “Have you shared any of our competition strategy with them? Have you _been_ sharing our competition strategy with them? Is that why they tied for us during Sectionals?”

“I—” Kurt looks from face to face, seeing only stony opposition meeting him. “What is going on? No, of course I’d never give away competition secrets—not that we have any, anyone who watches us for two seconds can tell that our strategy is to doo-wop behind Blaine while he warbles his way through the Top 40 list—”

A roar of discontent. “Are you going to keep letting him talk like this?” Trent demands of the court.

This is so stupid. This is so _stupid_. Pavarotti is dead and they’re more obsessed with decorum than an _actual avian life._ “So what if I’m dating a member of New Directions?” Kurt demands. If anyone presses, he’ll just say it’s Rachel. Blaine dated her for a bit, it’s not like Rachel dating gay Warblers is unheard-of. “Pavarotti is dead—”

“That’s the other thing, Kurt,” Wes says. “Tradition holds that if a canary dies while in the care of a Warbler, that Warbler is barred from competition for the rest of the academic year.”

Kurt stops.

“You’re not going to let me sing,” he realizes.

Wes, David, and Thad look back at him. They say nothing.

“Not even for Pavarotti.”

Blaine looks away.

Kurt storms out. Fine. He’ll bury Pavarotti himself. He’ll bedazzle the casket and sing the elegy himself. He’ll stand in the audience at Regionals and—

He brings a hand to his face. Hot tears spill down it. Oh. He’s crying.

Halfway back to his room, where Pavarotti is lying in-state, he slumps onto a bench and just sobs. For Pavarotti. For himself. For his stupid naivete that running away from his problems wouldn’t just create new ones.  
  
  
  
He sits in the back, a program clutched in his hand, and watches the crowds file inside. He’s always loved crowds. The flutter of anticipation, the nerves, the knowledge that he can’t screw-up, not like when he’s singing in front of the mirror, not like in Glee Club, the knowledge that _this is it_ , this is where he proves if he’s good enough.

He’s not going to be singing in front of this crowd.

“Hey,” says a voice behind him, the last one he wants to hear. Well. Second-from-last. After Blaine. He turns and sees Sam grinning, looking handsome in his all-black outfit and matte black tie. His smile falters when he looks at Kurt. “Why are you in your street clothes?”

“I’m not singing today,” he says, forcing a smile, and he really should’ve texted Sam the whole story yesterday, because Sam looks so concerned and so confused and so goddamned _gentle_ that it breaks him, it breaks him. “I—Pavarotti died, and I—”

“Oh, Kurt, I’m so goddamned _sorry,”_ Sam says, because he’s heard stories about Pavarotti, about how when he was alone and sad and missing his friends at McKinley, Pavarotti had hopped onto his hand and pecked the sadness out of him, about the way Kurt has decorated his cage, trying out the glitter minimalist aesthetic that he’s never really felt the urge to try out himself but which suits—suited—Pavarotti down to a T, because Kurt had brought Pavarotti off-campus, just the once, to meet Stacey and Stevie. Clearly without thinking, because anyone could see them, Sam opens his arms, and equally thoughtless, Kurt burrows into them, feeling hot tears leak onto Sam’s neat, lovely costume as the wound begins to bleed afresh. “But… why aren’t you performing?”

Kurt snorts. “I killed Pavarotti,” he says. “They won’t let me.” The rest of it—the _Sam_ part of it—that can wait until after Regionals. Sam doesn’t need Kurt’s problems weighing him down before he goes out to chase that high.

Sam makes a noise in the back of his throat that sounds a little like a snarl. Startled, Kurt pulls back, wide-eyed. Sam looks at him apologetically, but his words are gruff, “That’s stupid. You loved that bird, Kurt. They’re assholes to think anything else.”

Kurt smiles a faint smile. “Thanks. Just… go out there and win, will you?”

“I will,” Sam promises, and, glancing furtively around, sneaks a kiss to Kurt’s temple. Kurt smiles, and for the first time all day it doesn’t feel as though it’s been pasted on.  
  
  
  
“Hit me with the worst you got and knock me down,” Sam sings out, and Kurt stands up and starts cheering.  
  
  
  
“Hey. Hey, Kurt!”

Kurt glances over his shoulder and is only mildly surprised to see Sam jogging after him, still flush with victory. He’s never looked more attractive. Kurt considers he might have a competence kink, then shoulders it aside and smiles softly at Sam. “Congratulations, Samuel.”

Sam flushes. “I like it when you call me that,” he says lowly. “It doesn’t feel like I’m in trouble the way it does when my mom calls me that.”

Kurt grins at him. “You are definitely _not_ in trouble.” Sam is like the sun, like the slow heat of the day warming his skin and scattering light across the night-parched land. The depth of sadness that Kurt has been swimming in lessens just from being in Sam’s presence. Kurt wants to reach out and take his hand so badly. “Why’d you stop me?” Kurt asks. They’re still playacting at just being friends, and just friends don’t share moments like this in the parking lot after a show choir victory. Kurt glances through his eyelashes and tries to communicate that if Sam wants a victory lap in the Nav, he’ll have to ask _very_ nicely.

“Listen,” Sam says, “what are you doing after this?”

“I—” Kurt’s composure cracks. “Burying Pavarotti. I didn’t have time yesterday, and… I wasn’t sure if you guys would want me to celebrate with you.”

“Can I come with?” Sam asks unexpectedly.

Kurt lets out a startled laugh. “To a bird funeral?”

“To say goodbye to someone who was important to you,” Sam says gently, and Kurt’s eyes well with tears again. “I—I’ve never lost someone, but I’ve lost. Things. And I know it’s not the same, but. I want to be there for you, Kurt.”

They don’t take each other’s hands, because they’re still in public, but Kurt jerks his head toward his car and Sam follows, and that’s enough.  
  
  
  
“Farewell, sweet prince,” Kurt sighs, and Sam takes the shovel and begins to cover the casket.

“Why’d you choose this spot?” Sam asks as he works.

“It was one of Pavarotti’s favorites,” Kurt tells him. “I used to bring him outside to study when… when I was feeling lonely. I never got anything done in this spot because he would go crazy, chirping and hopping around his cage. I think…” he blinks back tears. “I think it reminded him of flying.”

Sam wipes sweat away from his forehead. “That was a nice eulogy,” he says.

“I was going to sing a song,” Kurt blurts out. “At the Warblers meeting. They stopped me, though.”

“Because of the Pavarotti thing?”

“And because of you.” Kurt looks at Sam, who freezes. He straightens up, his eyes searching Kurt’s. “Finn and Rachel saw us at the motel two nights ago. They confronted me about it, and one of the Warblers heard. They decided I was dating someone from McKinley. And they couldn’t have that.”

Sam looks lightning-struck. He stares down at the shovel in his hands, then tosses it aside and grabs for Kurt’s hand, and Kurt hangs onto it like a lifeline. “I’m sorry,” Kurt gasps, “I know you wanted to keep it secret a little longer… I denied it, but the Warblers didn’t believe me, and I don’t think Rachel did either… I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Sam says, and the hell of it is, it really does seem okay. Kurt scans his eyes for fear and what he finds is sorrow—for Kurt, not for himself. “I’ll deal with them. I’m just—I’m so _sorry_ , Kurt, that being with me meant you couldn’t sing at Regionals. It’s not fair, it shouldn’t matter.”

“Last year Jesse St. James egged Rachel to give Vocal Adrenaline a competitive edge at Regionals,” Kurt admits. “So it does matter.”

“It shouldn’t,” Sam says fiercely. “You know I’d never do that to you, right? Not even if you were the only thing between—between us and Nationals, or whatever. I—Kurt, I—”

“Don’t,” Kurt says quickly. He doesn’t want to hear it while they have to hide. He’ll do a lot of things for Sam, but that isn’t one of them, and Sam falls silent and Kurt thinks he’s understood.

“You could sing now,” Sam suggests, after the silence has settled around them like waiting birds. “For Pavarotti.”

“An elegy,” Kurt murmurs. “Yes. All right.”

And he closes his eyes and the words float to his tongue. _Blackbird singing in the dead of night…_

Sam takes his hand at “Into the light of a dark black night.”  
  
  
  
When he finishes, there’s clapping beside him. Sam looks first, and his expression twists into something Kurt can’t recognize. Kurt looks next, and there’s Blaine, his hands having fallen into his pockets and looking awkward.

“Is this your boyfriend?” Blaine asks, addressing the sky.

“I’m Sam,” Sam growls. Blaine’s eyes flick to him, take him in, and then skirt over to Kurt.

“Can we talk?” he asks plaintively, and Kurt nods at Sam slightly. Sam scowls, but begins taking the shovel back to the workman’s shed they’d liberated it from. Kurt watches appreciatively as his shirt stretches across his broad, sweat-soaked back.

Kurt starts walking back toward Dalton, and Blaine falls into step with him. Once, that would’ve seemed like romantic magic. Now, it just reminds him that he’s always had a thing for taller guys. “Kurt,” Blaine says hesitantly. “I… Are you… all right?”

Kurt shrugs. At Pavarotti’s grave, he’d talked about his mother with Sam, but he doesn’t want to bring that up now, on this cold, clear spring day. “Are you? The Warblers aren’t going to Nationals now.”

Blaine shrugs. “We usually don’t make it any farther than Regionals. A capella is a tough sell in the show choir world. People think it sounds auto-tuned.”

Kurt doesn’t think so. Kurt remembers the magic of Blaine looking right into his eyes and singing, _You—make—me—feel like I’m livin’ a—_

Blaine shrugs off his melancholy and smiles at Kurt. “Do you want to get a coffee?”

“You are _impossible_ ,” Kurt snaps, and Blaine steps back, alarmed. “I _waited_ for you to stick up for me in there—you dated a member of New Directions too, for like, two seconds—and you didn’t.”

Blaine’s voice goes frosty. “I was waiting for you to stick up for me when I thought I might be bisexual. The Warblers have always been behind me, no matter how confused I got, which is more than I can say for you.”

“I apologized, Blaine! I told you, I rethought my position—”

Blaine’s face twists. “Was _he_ the one who made you rethink your position on bi guys? Suddenly it’s not so ludicrous when you’re the one benefiting from a guy being flexible, huh?”

“That’s _not_ fair,” Kurt cries. “That is not fair and you know it, Blaine. What are you, jealous? Is this jealousy? Is the only reason you want to get coffee now is because I’m dating Sam?”

Blaine looks hurt. “No. No, I don’t… I don’t think so,” he says lamely, and then looks down on his shoes, rocks back on his heels. “I just—I thought you liked me, Kurt.”

“I thought you didn’t,” Kurt says, and the two of them stare at each other, and Kurt thinks, _Maybe in another life,_ and Blaine nods sharply, as though he’s heard it, and turns away. They’ve missed their chance. Maybe in another life they could’ve been something, Blaine could’ve found an attraction to Kurt later in their friendship, and Kurt would’ve been able to give him the time. Maybe it would’ve taken just a few more weeks. Maybe a few years. Maybe if there hadn’t been Sam, shining like the sun, coming over the hill.

Blaine cocks his head and asks, “Are you going back to McKinley?”

“I—” Kurt stops, having not thought about it before. “It’s not like I left to date you, Blaine.”

“I know,” Blaine says. “You left because… you were alone there, and you weren’t here. But I know you miss them. I know you… you dreamed about being in New York City with them, not with us. And you won’t be alone there anymore.”

“Maybe,” Kurt says, and Blaine nods, and turns on his heel, and walks away, and it feels like an end.

And then Sam takes his hand, and it feels like a beginning.

“Okay,” Kurt says, to no one at all. Sam looks at him questioningly, but he’s not really talking to him, not anymore. “Okay. I’ll go back.”  
  
  
  
“The thing is,” Kurt says to Sam later, when he’s caught him up on that whole conversation and thought process, “Karofsky. I’ve wanted to come back for a long time now—the novelty of a uniform wears off faster than last fall’s fashions—but if the terror is just going to begin again…”

“Actually,” Sam says, looking surprisingly thoughtful for him, “I think Santana took care of that, too.”  
  
  
  
“Huh,” Kurt says as he looks at one of the posters for the Bully Whips tacked up over McKinley High’s front entrance.  
  
  
  
He doesn’t stage a big dramatic number for his return. He might have, once upon a time, when it was just himself he was risking, but there’s Sam to think about now, and he’s not sure he could stand if it Sam looked away from him and cringed as he shimmied down the stairs to the quad. Instead, he stands in front of the Glee Club, asks the band to play Barbra, and sings, “ _I don’t know why I’m frightened_  
 _I know my way around here_  
 _The cardboard trees, the painted scenes_  
 _The sound here…”_

At “ _Could I stop my hands from shaking? Has there ever been a moment with so much—to live for—”_ he starts looking at Sam, and he. He can’t stop? He meets his gaze, his sweet blue-eyed gaze, and though he’s singing with his heart, at once his whole soul just _pours_ into the notes, and he is singing _to_ Sam, with the rest of the Glee Club, warm, familiar faces all, fade into the backdrop. He was afraid of this. He was afraid that he would get up in front of Glee Club to sing and _lose his goddamn mind_ , he’s not out yet, they’re not out yet, what is he _doing_ —

At the last line, he’s shaking, his hands trembling as he holds the note on “dream,” and people are already clapping but he only has eyes, mortified, apologetic eyes for Sam, but Sam is—smiling—grinning, really, he looks so proud and so bright-eyed and so sweet—and coming down from the risers and pulling Kurt into a hug—

“Sam, no,” Kurt whispers, still trembling—

“It’s okay, Kurt,” Sam says. “It’s okay, I told them. I told them.” And a wet tear is sliding down Kurt’s cheek as he buries his face in Sam’s shoulder, and just over the crest of his Letterman colors he sees Mr. Schue start to stand, and the others are clapping and stomping their feet, and Sam is _holding him_ in front of all their friends and _proud_ , and then Kurt is crying for real, because he has _missed_ this and when he left it, frightened and beaten down, he could’ve _never_ imagined the Kurt Hummel that returned, or what he would come with.

So what if the school doesn’t know? Their family does. And for now, that’s enough.  
  
  
  
There’s a moment, with Puck, as Glee Club files out. Sam has to rush out to pick up Stacey and Stevie, so Kurt is left to loiter, to laugh with his friends, Rachel and Mercedes and Tina, who seem to linger along with him to stretch this moment out, like they still can’t believe they’ll have more moments like this one. Puck is shuffling down the risers on his way to basketball practice with the rest of the boys when he pauses and meets Kurt’s eyes, and in that moment Rachel, laughing, turns away to shove playfully at Mercedes’s shoulder, and it’s just Puck and Kurt, staring at each other, something flaring between them.

“Congrats,” Puck says, and there’s—genuine feeling there, Kurt is surprised to see. Admiration, almost, the way an alpha defers to the victor of a hard-fought race, but there’s also a faint sadness in his eyes that Kurt can’t quite place. “Welcome back,” Puck adds, and then he’s gone, and Kurt blinks, and turns back to Tina, who’s asking him about how the Warblers reacted to his transfer, like it never happened at all.  
  
  
  
“Do you ever worry about Puck?” Kurt asks as they’re on a date one night—which means babysitting in the motel, which Glee now knows is Sam’s home. _The Sound of Music_ is on in the background, and Kurt has been cheerfully humming along, and occasionally bursting into song, much to Stacey’s delight.

Sam opens his mouth to reply, but the children interrupt. “He does a better Maria than you,” Stacey says cheerfully, and Sam laughs and doesn’t appear offended at all.

“Yes,” Sam says, “but I can play the guitar,” and together the two of them put on a two-man _Sound of Music_ show until the children are blissfully, entirely asleep.

Kurt makes noises about helping Sam with his Algebra II, the vague notions he remembers of it from last year, anyway, but Sam grins and pulls him on his lap and begin to kiss him, and thought flies from his head. Sam is gentle but possessive; his hand slips down into Kurt’s back pocket, his other hand resting on Kurt’s waist, to draw him in close, to grind up against him with all the suppressed passion of two teenage boys in close proximity but never enough time to do anything about it. They make out leisurely, the sound of the Von Trapps’ escape playing softly in the background, until, finally, Sam lazily blinks his eyes open and says, “I think he knew?”

“Hmmm?” There should be laws about not being spoken to after having been kissed that thoroughly.

“Puck,” Sam clarifies. “I think he knew about… you know. My family. He never said anything, but he used to cover for me when I was late to basketball practice, before I quit the team.”

“Samuel, were you thinking about Puck while we were making out?” Kurt huffs.

“Oof,” Sam says, _“now_ I’m in trouble,” and he’s _not_ , is the thing, not really. Even though Sam and Puck have made out, and it was apparently _very good_ , good enough to turn two formerly straight boys bisexual, Kurt can’t think of Puck as a rival; it trips a strange wire in his head. Honestly, the idea of Sam thinking of Puck is kind of hot, as long as Sam is _also_ thinking of Kurt. “Sorry. I just… I was trying not to think about, you know, anything too…” he lowers his voice, in case Stacey or Stevie are feigning sleep like little devils, “ _sexy_ , and being homeless is kind of the unsexiest thing for me right now, and I was thinking that Puck knew, even though I never told him.”

“Your mind astonishes me,” Kurt says affectionately, and presses a kiss to his forehead.

“He was always sticking up for me in Glee, too, when the whole _Muckracker_ thing was going down,” Sam says to his shoes. “Said he was _sure_ there was nothing going on between me and Quinn, or me’n’you. I think he was pretty shocked when it turned out he was wrong about that.”

“I think he likes you,” Kurt blurts out. “Like. _Like_ likes you.”

But Sam shakes his head. “He just likes getting a rise outta me,” Sam says. “He doesn’t _like_ me, not the way…” He glances at Kurt shyly. Kurt smiles at him encouragingly. “Not the way _you_ like me.”

Kurt smiles at him. “I do like you,” he says, and kisses Sam’s forehead, then each of his eyelids, this the tip of his nose. “I like… every… bit of you.”

They can’t go much farther than that, not with Stacey and Stevie in the room next door, but Kurt drives home with a grin splitting his face and his heart thumping cheerfully in his chest along to the Adele album he has in the stereo.  
  
  
  
That’s how most of their dates pass, with Sam tending to his responsibilities and Kurt tagging along, but neither of them minds. When things get too much, when Sam looks like the weight of it all is going to crush him, Kurt wraps him in his arms and drags him into the Nav so that he can slump into Kurt’s shoulder, wraps him up in his arms and feels grateful for the way that Sam lets him in, lets him be strong for the both of them.

One particularly bad night, Sam ends up at Kurt’s house while Kurt makes dinner for them—individual chicken pot pies. He has Sam chopping carrots, and it swiftly becomes clear that Sam never makes Stacey and Stevie anything but mac and cheese out of a box for a reason. As Sam sucks on his thumb, Kurt turns to julienne the chicken, and hears a sniffle. He drops the knife.

“Sam,” he says, his voice already wobbly. He can never handle it when someone else cries.

Sam buries his face in his hands. “Sorry—sorry—so stupid—”

“You’re _not_ stupid, Sam,” Kurt says, having been around him long enough to know what these moods look like. “Come on, it’s just a knife. It’s a skill, and you haven’t done it a lot. Like me and weights. You have to build up the muscle memory.”

“Not that.” Sam swipes at his eyes. He’s beautiful when he cries. He doesn’t go blotchy the way Kurt does, his eyes just grow red as he sniffles, like a Disney prince. “I mean, yeah, that. But it’s just… Stevie got in a fight today, and Stacey…” He trails off in the manner of the truly helpless.

“What happened with Stacey?” Kurt asks, frightened.

“She got her period today in school,” Sam blurts out. “And Stevie punched out some little prick who was making fun of her for it. And I—I don’t know what to do, Kurt—Mom’s always working overtime and it pays for the roof over our heads, but all the rest of the stuff, all the food and the clothes, that’s on me and my pizzas, and we can’t. We can’t afford pads or tampons or anything.”

“Oh, Sam,” Kurt says, and draws him close, smushes his face into his chest as though the strength of his hug can keep him safe from hardness of the world. “Sam. Sam, I’m sorry.”

“Maybe if I got another job—” Sam frets, somehow, even when overwhelmed and crying, trying to think about what he can do to make this all right.

“No, Sam, you’re running yourself ragged already. If worst comes to worst, _I_ will lend you the money for it, okay? Don’t—” he says when Sam opens his mouth to protest. “No pride right now, okay? It’s for Stacey, and it’s just a loan, you can pay me back after we graduate. It’s not charity. You’re not my charity case, so you can stop thinking that right now.” Sam closes his mouth. Kurt kisses it in gratitude.

“Okay,” Sam says finally, but he still looks battered and tired.

“What is it?” Kurt asks.

“And then there’s prom,” Sam blurts out.

“Prom? What about prom?”

“I wanted… I wanted to pay for your ticket,” Sam says shyly. “Even if we couldn’t go together, I wanted us to… to be together, in just that little way. But I can’t even pay for myself to go, much less two people.”

“Why can’t I pay for _your_ ticket?” Kurt asks, half-teasing, half-serious.

Sam blinks, like he’s never thought of it before. “I—”

“I know I’m fabulous, darling, but I’m not actually a girl. That’s the greatness of gay: neither of us has to fit into those old-fashioned gender roles if we want to. Or either of us can, if we do.” Kurt presses a kiss to Sam’s knuckles, then reaches up and wipes away the vestiges of tears. “Sam Evans. Would you make me the happiest man on earth and go to prom with me… I mean, not _with me._ But with me?”

“Yeah,” Sam breathes, and kisses him so hard that Kurt squeaks and jolts forward, his startled hands coming to rest in Sam’s hair, then skirting over his back—

A throat clears behind him, and Kurt goes white and whirls. Oh god. His dad. His _heart_. “Dad!” he squeaks, and behind him Sam stands and backs behind the island so abruptly that it almost unbalances him. He shoots a glance at Sam, bewildered, and finds him red-faced and with the kitchen island between Dad’s line of sight and his crotch. Kurt wants to laugh. He’s too busy being mortified. “Oh my god, Dad, I didn’t think you’d be home for—for—”

He glances at the clock. They’ve been talking _way_ too long.

“Yeah,” Dad grunts. “That much was obvious.”

Dad eyes Sam, a little meanly, and Sam goes pale. He looks a mess, still a little red-eyed, his hair mussed from having Kurt’s hands in it, the kitchen island still determinedly protecting his modesty. “You’re Sam, right? Finn’s friend. One of the Glee boys.”

“Y-yes, sir,” Sam squeaks. Kurt wonders if this is the first time he’s ever met an SO’s dad—he knows Quinn is living with just her mom now.

“Huh,” Dad says, and turns back to Kurt. “So when’s dinner gonna be ready?”

“Thirty minutes as soon as I get the pies in the oven,” Kurt chirps, as though it will make him go away _any faster_.

“Okay,” Dad says. He turns back to Sam. “Listen,” he begins, and Kurt cringes, ready for whatever damage control he’s going to have to do.

“You need any help at all, you come here, you understand?” Dad says, and Kurt—blinks. That wasn’t what he was expecting.

“Uh—” Sam stutters. Obviously it wasn’t what he was expecting either.

“I heard what you were saying, about your brother and sister. Sounds like you take real good care of them. And Kurt, he’s a good kid, but he doesn’t know what it’s like to have little people depend on you. So if you need any help, money or anything, you come to me, okay?”

“O-okay,” Sam says, still looking bewildered. Dad nods, decisively, then executes a swift about-face and moves away. Kurt and Sam share looks.

Then Dad calls over his shoulder, “And Kurt, for Chrissake, next time _tell me_ when you’re having a boy over,” and Kurt giggles nervously and Sam’s face splits into a grin, and for a moment, it’s all right.  
  
  
  
The week before prom, Rachel corrals the two of them into a corner with Mercedes. She smiles at them, the surprisingly sweet smile Rachel is capable of when she’s had a thoughtful moment. “We had a prom proposition for you,” she says.  
  
  
  
“Good news, boys,” Dad trundles in joyfully. “My buddy Enzo down at the tux rental shop is giving you half off.”

“Sweet,” Kurt can hear Finn say faintly downstairs.

“Yeah,” Dad says. “So what are you gonna go with?”

“Are there… options?” Sam asks. So sweet. So naive. Finn and Dad, who have been subject to the Kurt Hummel School of Thought on the Classic Tux, both laugh.

“It’s all right, Sam,” Kurt says, dashing downstairs, ready to show off his tux. “I’ve already picked out yours. Finn, you’re my brother and I love you, but you’re on your own. No need for half off my outfit!”

“Because half of it is already off?” Dad quips, like he’s funny. 

“My _ensemble_ is an homage to the recent royal wedding. And the late Alexander McQueen. I had to make it myself,” he informs Sam. “There is simply nothing off the rack that is suitable for the young fashionable man in Ohio.”

“Dude, that rocks,” Finn says. “It’s like gay Braveheart.”

Kurt grins and spins.

“I don’t like it,” Dad announces.

“Well, of course you don’t like it!” Kurt says cheerfully. For a less discerning eye like Finn, it might flash and dazzle, but Dad has lived with him for close to two decades now. “It’s not finished yet. I think it still needs, like, a sash, or maybe some beads around here—”

“Look, I’m not going to stop you from wearing it, but I gotta be honest, I—I think you’re just trying to stir the pot a little bit, I think you’re just trying to get some attention.”

“Exactly!” Kurt says, exasperated and not a little confused. “What’s the point of dressing up? I mean, that’s why some guys wore the tails with the top hat and some girls wore the hoop skirts.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Dad says darkly, and Kurt stops. “There’s a lot of bad people, and they’re a lot worse than this Karofsky kid. And all they’re looking for is a match to light under the fire of their hate. Now, of course I—I want—I want you to be yourself! But I also, I want you to be _practical._ ”

Kurt turns to Sam. No tears, not yet, but he can feel them coming. “What do you think?” he says, though he already knows the answer. Sam’s a boy in the closet; he _defines_ practicality. 

But Sam looks at him steadily. “I think you look amazing,” he says, and Kurt breaks into a bright, joyful grin. “I think you really did… Steve McQueen justice.”

Kurt ignores that. “See?” he says to Dad. “I am _wearing_ this suit. I worked hard on it, and I think it’s fantastic, and my boyfriend agrees… and that’s all that matters.” Finn is nodding along enthusiastically, and Sam is smiling at him, that small, shy smile that contains entire worlds, and it feels good, to feel _backed up_ for once, a feeling he hasn’t really had since the wedding and Finn singing to him. “I’m sorry you don’t like it, Dad. I hope you change your mind.”

And, fully confident in himself and his choices for the first time in a _long_ time, he flounces back upstairs.  
  
  
  
“No,” Kurt says when Sam holds up the bolo tie, and he pouts, but Kurt thrusts a simple pale pink, nearly white, bow tie at him and kisses Sam until he stops pouting.  
  
  
  
In the limo, Sam can’t stop staring at Kurt’s legs. Kurt crosses them smugly and smiles.  
  
  
  
They go to dinner with Kurt and Mercedes at Breadstix. Officially, they’re just going as a friend group, but this way Mercedes and Rachel have someone to flatter them and flirt with them during their junior prom and Sam and Kurt have cover. They’re not going to be dancing with each other, which makes something low and painful throb in Kurt’s chest, but that’s okay. They’re _going_ with each other, and Sam’s ticket was paid for with Kurt’s money, and they’re holding hands under the table and Kurt has a _boyfriend_ for his _junior prom_ and it’s _Sam fucking Evans_ and Kurt’s boutonniere matches Sam’s tie, which is subtle enough that none of the Neanderthals should get it, though Sam does, and Rachel, from how she grins and flicks Kurt’s boutonniere when she sees them, also does.

Rachel, who brought Jesse St. James.

“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Kurt whispers in her ear, and she—looks at him with such desperate confusion that he shuts up about it.

“I’m really sorry to hear about what happened with your family, Sam,” Jesse is saying, and Kurt’s eyes grow round as buttons and he twists his head around to glare at Rachel, who looks mortified.

“Um, I hope it’s okay; I sort of filled Jesse in on what was going on.”

“Of course it’s okay,” Jesse says. “Sam has nothing to be ashamed of. I know how tough it is out there, I couldn’t even get a job as one of those singing waiters at Johnny Rockets.”

“That’s not really the same thing,” Kurt says icily, and Sam puts a hand on Kurt’s shoulder and shakes his head.

Jesse looks undaunted. He grins a shark-smile at them. “So how long have you been going out, boys?”

“Kurt and Sam are just friends,” Mercedes butts in, and favors Jesse with a glare so strong that even he knows better than to keep going. Silence falls over the table for a minute. There are five of them, which is an odd number, and after a moment, Quinn and Finn stroll up to their booth. Quinn looks radiant; Finn looks like the All-American quarterback that he is. Kurt smiles at him, but quietly thinks that he prefers the sleek lines of Sam’s suit, even if he’d had to wrestle the bolo tie out of Sam’s hands.

“Hey, guys,” Quinn chirps. “You look amazing!” Any minute now— “And don’t forget to vote for Hudson-Fabray tonight.” And there it is. Kurt smiles at Quinn, though he doesn’t really understand. He’s never had any delusions of becoming Prom King. He wonders what it must be like, to be vying for High School Royalty.

“Hey, Jesse,” Finn says, in the fakest polite voice Kurt has ever heard. “What’d you order, scrambled eggs? I mean, I know you usually like them served on people’s heads.”

Jesse fires back with a quip about Grace Kelly and Finn’s feet. Mercedes chases them off, but Rachel is looking at her clasped hands on the table. After a moment, she squeaks out, “I’m just gonna—bathroom—” and squeezes past Jesse to get out.

“Excuse me,” Kurt tells Sam, and follows her out.

He finds her in the girls’ bathroom, but the gay vibe radiating from him in the kilt must be strong, because the two girls he doesn’t recognize coming out of the bathroom don’t even give him a second look when he pushes the door open. Rachel is staring at her reflection in the mirror, shaking a little. Her dress doesn’t really flatter her complexion, but Kurt knows better than to tell her that. “You okay?” he asks softly.

“I wish he would just make up his mind,” Rachel says tightly. “He loves me, he loves me not. He loves Quinn—” her voice cracks, and she looks horrified. Kurt immediately feels for her; this is Rachel, whose voice _never_ cracks, not even when tears are streaming down her face during a particularly emotional rendition of a Streisand showtune. He puts a hand on her shoulder.

“He does love you, Rachel,” Kurt says softly.

Rachel wipes at her eyes, carefully, to avoid smudging her mascara. Kurt picks up a paper towel and begins dabbing at a little blot at the corner of her eye she’s missed. “He called her Grace Kelly,” Rachel murmurs, and Kurt knows she’s not talking about Finn anymore. “No one’s ever gonna call me Grace Kelly.”

“I always liked Ginger Rogers better anyway,” Kurt tells her, which is a rotten lie, and Rachel knows it, she’s had stirring arguments with him over the Golden Age of Broadway often enough. But she huffs out a laugh, like he meant her to, and he smiles and offers her his arm.

“Game face on?” he asks, and she nods.

They walk out arm-in-arm. Jesse is talking intently with the waiter; Mercedes is flushing from something Sam has just said to her. Kurt sidles in between them. “What did I miss?”

“I was just telling Mercedes how beautiful she looked,” Sam says, and Kurt grins and kisses her on the cheek.

“You do, you know,” Kurt tells her. “Look beautiful.”

“Thanks, Kurt,” she says tinily, and then ducks her head to compose herself. Kurt grins at her, and at Rachel, and is momentarily grateful that he and Sam couldn’t go as a couple. He wouldn’t have wanted to have this night without His Girls by his side.

And Jesse. But nothing’s ever perfect.  
  
  
  
Prom passes in a series of moments—  
  
  
  
They’re dancing as a group while Puck belts out, _“It’s a quarter after one, I’m all alone, and I need you now—”_

Sam whispers in his ear, “I’m up next, but I wanted to tell _you_ —you look beautiful tonight—”  
  
  
  
There’s a scuffle out of the corner of his eye and Kurt turns his head to see—oh no—Jesse and Finn shoving each other—

He runs to them, but before he can get their Coach Sylvester is there, separating them with the force of her iron grip and shouting, “Prom is over for you, Sugar Ray! You too, Marvelous Marvin!”

Kurt trails after them anxiously, but Finn catches his eye and shakes his head. He looks shocked and rueful, but he mouths to Kurt, _“Don’t_ —” and Sam takes his elbow and looks at him pleadingly, _Don’t_ , and Kurt doesn’t.  
  
  
  
David Karofsky wins Prom King.

Sam snorts under his breath, but it’s Kurt’s turn to restrain him. He gently strokes a thumb on the inside of Sam’s elbow, wondering whether Sam can feel it through the thick cloth, waiting to see which of the Glee girls will be Prom Queen—a _Glee_ Prom Queen, imagine—

“And now, your 2011 McKinley High Prom Queen… with an overwhelming number of write-in votes, is—”

Wait, what?

“Kurt Hummel.”  
  
  
  
A light flashes on his face.  
  
  
  
Someone in the back whoops.  
  
  
  
This is a dream, right? This is a nightmare, like the nightmares he’s heard you have about coming to school naked—  
  
  
  
Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Puck on the stage, shouting at Figgins—  
  
  
  
But Sam is looking at him with a shocked, devastated look, and that’s how Kurt knows it’s real, because he could _never_ imagine that look on Sam’s face. Never.  
  
  
  
His heart pounds in his throat. Tears are threatening, but he can’t. Not in front of everyone. He can’t. He looks at the faces, the staring blank faces of people who probably voted for him, and realizes how stupid, how utterly _naive_ he was. Dad was right, but not wearing the kilt wouldn’t have managed to stop this. Someone has been planning this since the day he came back to McKinley. And enough of the student body— _enough of the whole school_ —thought, yes, let’s make the queer kill himself.

Kurt walks away.  
  
  
  
“Kurt? Stop! Kurt!” a girl calls after him, but he doesn’t.  
  
  
  
He comes back to himself in the hall outside the gymnasium, panting for breath, tears streaming down his cheeks. His knuckles sting—he’s punched a locker. Somehow Rachel is at his side, saying his name frantically. “Kurt, Kurt! Stop, please, you’ll hurt yourself—”

“I’ve never been so humiliated,” he gasps out, which is saying. _So much._ He’s been slushied, thrown into dumpsters, locked into Port-a-Potties, he’s danced to “Single Ladies” while the whole football team and a hostile crowd was watching, he’s _run away_ from the death threats and the constant fear and never. Never in his whole life has he wanted to exist less.

“Kurt,” Mercedes says at his other elbow, “Kurt, please—”

And then arms wrap around him and drag him back from the locker, and he fights him, but the faintly spicy scent of Sam’s cheap aftershave envelopes him and he goes limp in his arms. “Kurt,” Sam says, and this, alone, gets through to him. Sam’s wrecked, ruined voice, that beautiful voice weighed down with sorrow and secondhand pain, and Kurt turns and buries his face in Sam’s jacket, gasping, “You shouldn’t have come—you shouldn’t have followed me—”

“We all came,” Mercedes says. “They won’t think anything of it.”

“I get it,” Kurt sobs. “I get why—why even if you—you love me, you won’t do it. Why you wouldn’t come out. I thought that because no one was teasing me, or beating me up, that—that no one cared. You can take away Karofsky, you can take away the ringleaders, you can—you can put a system like the Bully Whips in place—and _none of it matters,_ nothing changes, nothing will ever change. What you went through, Sam—you knew better than me all along. I never want you to go through that again. So we can’t.”

“Kurt,” Sam says, his voice tight with pain, “are you breaking up with me?”

“Yes,” Kurt sobs.

“Kurt, you can’t,” Rachel cries.

“Kurt,” Mercedes sighs.

“No,” Sam says.

“No?” Kurt half-laughs, half-sobs.

“No, I’m not letting you do this,” Sam says, and all the pain has drained out of his voice. “Kurt. I. I love you. I love you because you are the strongest, bravest person I know, and I am _not_ going to let you take the best thing in my life away from me out of fear. You have _never_ in your life bowed down to fear before. That’s why you’re here, at this school. That’s why you’re wearing that outfit. That’s why you’re going to go back in there,” his voice goes fierce and rough, “and tell all of them to fuck off.”

“I don’t know if I’m strong enough,” Kurt whispers.

Sam leans down and kisses him. It’s not like any kiss he’s ever given him before; it’s passionate, yes, but like breathing is passionate, like kicking your way to the surface from drowning is passionate. Like Kurt is a lifeline, a rope, a tether to keep Sam from falling into the abyss.

It’s strange; that’s how Kurt feels about Sam, too.

How could he ever thought he could give this feeling up?

Sam breaks the kiss and presses his forehead against Kurt’s, and for the first time, he can see the fear in Sam’s eyes as well. “Strong enough?” Sam asks, and Kurt nods. He can be. For Sam. He can be the rock that Sam relies on to haul himself out of turbulent waters, he can be the harbor in the stormy sea of Sam’s life.

Rachel takes his arm. Mercedes takes his other arm. Sam stands in front of him, ready to do battle.

“Then go in there and get crowned,” Sam says.  
  
  
  
He opens the door and steps onto the stage. From the corner of his eye, he can see Rachel and Mercedes file into the crowd, but Sam still stands by the door, a big blond sentry, and it makes him feel. Safe.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Figgins says, “your 2011 Prom Queen, Kurt Hummel.”

He puts the crown on Kurt’s head and hands him the scepter. Kurt takes a step closer to the microphone, and perhaps sensing that he owes him this moment, Figgins steps back and allows him to speak.

Kurt takes a deep breath, looking over the crowd. He doesn’t look back at Sam. He doesn’t have to. He catches Tina’s eye, then Brittany’s, then Puck’s. To Puck, he says, “Eat your heart out, Kate Middleton,” and waits.

Mercedes cheers, and then people begin to clap.

Kurt smiles tremulously. Next to him, Figgins chuckles and pats him on the shoulder. “And now,” he says, “behold the tradition of our 2011 Prom King and Queen sharing their first dance.”

Karofsky steps up from where he’s been lounging on the Prom King chair. His crown is tilted at an angle that might be called rakish on anybody else. “Now’s your moment,” Kurt whispers to him.

”What?”

“Come out. Make a difference.”

Mercedes and Santana launch into “Dancing Queen.” Dave looks at him, agony in his eyes. The same agony that he has seen in Sam’s eyes.

“I can’t,” he whispers, and he walks off the dance floor. And Kurt is standing there, alone, while music plays in the background, with no one to dance with. Tears prickle at his eyes again, but he tilts his chin up. _The strongest, bravest person I know._ He can be strong. He can be brave.

And then Sam is there.

“Excuse me,” he says. “Can I have this dance?”

“Sam,” Kurt whispers. “What are you doing?”

“Being brave and strong enough to be worthy of you,” Sam says, and without asking, he takes Kurt’s hand, and starts to sway.  
  
  
  
Kurt closes his eyes and buries his face in Sam’s shoulder, and for the second time that night, tears come.  
  
  
  
He and Sam sway through the song, and share a kiss as it peters into silence. Around them, people are cheering. The Glee Club, Kurt registers, but… not _just_ the Glee Club. The kids who didn’t vote for him, the kids who have seen him take this and prove that no one could touch him and are _cheering_ for him, the kids to whom he _means_ something, to whom he is a symbol. He fancies that every gay kid everywhere is in that crowd, and is cheering.

Sam holds him through the next song, and the song after that. Mr. Schue doesn’t come get them for more performances. He seems to get that this is just for them.  
  
  
  
Later, there are cuddles on Kurt’s bed. And after that, there’s hot, wet kisses traded between them, Kurt’s hand slipping down Sam’s belly and brushing against his cock, and then into the waistband of his pajamas and boxers, and his fingers gently feeling out the first cock he’s ever touched beside his own, and Sam gasping and shoving his fist into his mouth to keep himself quiet, and Kurt gasps so harshly it burns his throat. 

The clock’s numbers are brilliantly scarlet, imprinting onto his eyelids so that he sees the numbers when he squeezes his eyes shut and he is feverish, hot, the sheets shift over his skin like lava and it is sensory overload, it burns and it doesn’t and he wants to die or maybe live. Sam is panting in his ear, _ah, ah,_ and his own hand is fumbling for Kurt’s cock and when he gets his hand on him Kurt almost loses it right then and there, the feeling of Sam’s guitar-and-football calluses brushing against his sensitive skin. He thinks he could get off on the sounds Sam is making alone, the little jerks of Sam’s hips as he reaches for friction and heat, but Sam’s hand is _right there_ and Kurt is gasping, he’s dying, he’s living—

One of them comes first, but they’re so entangled in each other that he can’t tell which.

“That was—” Sam says, dazedly, when it’s over.

“Yeah,” Kurt whispers, and bites gently at his earlobe, “yeah,” and in his head, he replays the moment when Sam _came out for him_ and told he him loved him in ways more profound than any words could ever manage, and thinks that the worst night of his life has become, weirdly, the best.  
  
  
  
Puck finds them in the music room the next morning. They’re practicing a duet, the duet that they never got to sing, and Kurt wants to do a version of “I Know Him So Well” from _Chess_ with one of the parts scaled down from Sam and Sam wants to rearrange B.o.B.’s “Nothin’ on You.” “Hey,” Puck says, shifting from one foot to the other, “you guys okay?”

Kurt and Sam trade looks. With a dopey grin, Sam says, “Fabulous,” and Kurt giggles, and Puck seems to get it, because he edges back to the door.

“Okay,” he says. “Good. Okay then,” and then he turns and is gone. Kurt looks after him, but he’s soon lost in the crowds of McKinley, so he turns his attention back to Sam, who is saying something adorably wrong about Bruno Mars, not giving any more thought to Puck.


End file.
